HOCO always had Rec Plus...at the time they where called the Cobra league, if memory serves me.OSVAlacrosse wrote: ↑Mon Feb 13, 2023 1:51 pmHOCO league would be a good test to see if youth lacrosse will ever go age based and enforce it. NVYLL has always been able to manage this. I still do not understand why a club would not work harder to support youth lacrosse when that is where they get their customers.steel_hop wrote: ↑Wed Feb 01, 2023 1:31 pmThis is more an issue of HOCO than anything else. It crushed MD rec youth lacrosse and now it is doing the same in NoVa. I don't know if there are other HOCO like leagues around (I'm sure there are) but it makes me wonder whether this is happening in other places to the detriment of youth rec leagues. HOCO's ability to put travel/club teams in leagues with higher level of games certainly has caused issues in the rec leagues. Because the 7th and 8th graders play on Saturday and the NVYLL plays boys games on Saturday - rec games at the 14U level are basically true rec games. And that can be alright but it does have an impact on participation.OSVAlacrosse wrote: ↑Mon Nov 21, 2022 2:18 pm The real problem is that our youth program (NVYLL) was the largest in all of US lacrosse when I started coaching at the youth level and now it is shrinking fast. It used to be tough to make the A team now they have trouble fielding two teams. We have more clubs and far fewer players trying out for these clubs. The market supply and demand will cause the: True lacrosse, NLF, 3 Step, Madlax, folks ect to re-think the system as they are the only ones that can change the system.
I won't get into the internal cannibalization that some programs are doing to field "elite" club teams in HOCO
So one other thing about the rec leagues that are generally run by the county or local youth lacrosse club (at least for the NVYLL) is that many of these club teams now are running mini-rec leagues. My inbox is filled with Next Level emails about playing in their "rec" league.
I believe the HOCO issue came after the initial CLUB time bomb. I coached in AACty for years, when they had AA, A, B, and C brackets at almost every level. Then, we started to see the rise of competitive/select clubs. Crabs, Hawks, Mavericks, Cannons, MADlax, Club Blue, VEL, Next Level, and few others...each club had to offer an approved Turf field to be in the league, was called the NPYLL, run by Cabul Maddux if I recall. This is the era when private club owners where making real cash. This model spawned the east coast and headed west and was when we saw college assistant coaches leaving to run franchise leagues for 3D in major markets. Which spawned even more like 91, True, LIExpress....
The idea was, stay on your rec team and play Saturday games, then come play for your select team on Sundays.....the Select Clubs where promising games only on Sunday's...to avoid conflict. That chipped away and chipped away and chipped away at the rec scene, where parents and kids had to ultimately make a choice....pick one b/c we can no longer do both.
Then became the increased access to fields as the league grew, and if memory serves me, AACty was no longer allowing outside clubs to use their fields. Someone had a contact with HOCO and the flood gate opened breathing continued life.
Moms and Dads that are ex players or would be coaches, are going to gravitate to Club Scenes b/c of the competitive nature and more opportunities for johnny and jill to get a foot in the door and a major private school and ultimately college opportunity.
In short, I believe the toothpaste is out of the tube.
Another new scene that has recently flared up is 'academy' style businesses. Not necessarily a team/club based model, but come to us for instructional time, like music lessons and we will teach you child what they are not getting at a team practice....much like a tutor. These have shown to be quite lucrative and often lead to yet another Select Club that provides teams for competition at showcases.
IMO, all the above is a detriment to the sport as a whole, b/c it only caters to families with the discretionary income to spend for these often outrageously priced clubs and academies.
When we where in the AACty league, the player fee was something like $80-100 for the spring, plus uniforms, which covered official fees. It has not changed much in the last 12 years. SEE HERE